Teachers

Do you know the wherabouts of any of our teacher? Jurd? Van? Weiss? Causer? Hunt even??
If you do let us know so we can invite them along.

Profile - Ted Hartnell

What are your strongest memories of NSBHS?
Playing basketball at Melbourne in the Crawford Shield. After our first game one of the Melbourne coaches took pity on us and started putting us some through drills. By the third game we had improved so much that we lost by only 99 points!

Summarize briefly your life since school.
My current life can be summarized by the words “Ice Hockey”.

Right now I’m living in Lebanon, New Hampshire (USA) and while I’ve never been to Beirut, I’m pretty confident that New Hampshire’s Lebanon has nothing in common with its more famous namesake. For one thing, we are completely isolated up here – halfway between Montreal and Boston there are lots of trees, lots of snow, and no people.

We are here because my wife, Song, is attending nearby Dartmouth College – the university that inspired the movie “Animal House”. Specifically she is attending the Tuck School of Business (http://www.tuck.dartmouth.edu/). I love business school (having done it once already at Berkeley, California) so I jumped at the chance to quit my job and move out here with her.

Nick Verne’s job sounds so cool that it is going to be hard for me to convince you that my previous San Francisco job was awesome. But it was! I worked for this company called Wind River (http://www.windriver.com/) that wrote software for everything that America thinks is important. Our software not only runs the Internet, but runs all of those guided missiles in Iraq. In fact, our software is running the Mars Rovers (http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/) and it was my bug that famously crippled “Spirit” for a week when it first landed on Mars.

So where does ice hockey come into this story? Well, I’ve been playing ice hockey for Tuck for the last two years and, while I spend most of my time warming the bench, I’m getting pretty good! In fact, we played Harvard Business School a couple of weeks ago in a tournament and I scored an assist! While an “assist” is not actually a goal but is credited to the guy that made the goal happen, it definitely ranks up there among my proudest moments!

Who are the most important people in your life today?

The Tuck Hockey Team. Oh, and Song I guess.

For more photos of the Tuck Hockey team go to:
http://tuckhockey.shutterfly.com/

For more photos of Song and me (the “Holiday Hartnells”) go to:
http://www.onegen.com/cgi-bin/twiki/bin/view/Family/FamilyPhotos

Profile - Nick Verne

What are your strongest memories of NSBHS?
Early on, the year 7 lawn, that riverboat show we did, the guys (Brett Murphy, Danny Yee, more) who visited me weekly in hospital when my legs were broken, dividing the school day up into work periods and "bludge" periods, the Melbourne exchanges, the school orchestra, a shifting cast of friends. Getting serious in the senior years, music periods with Stephen James and me as the whole class, the formal, the muck-up day gathering at Balmoral.

Summarize briefly your life since school.
I went to straight to Sydney Uni for Electrical Engineering, starting with a few other NSBHSers including Michael Gadiel and Ted Hartnell.
Shifted over to science for third year because I was more interested in that. I started a PhD in pure mathematics but found myself more interested in life outside school and drifted into a small video business with all the usual problems of someone with no business education. In 1995 I was offered a job with a tech startup company in California and I decided to take the chance. The dot-com bubble was just beginning, and it turned out that the company was one of those that fooled venture capitalists into funding a lot of hot air. Hooray for the "new economy". Although it was at least four more years of madness before the crash, one year was enough for me.
I got a new job as a video game programmer at Visual Concepts Entertainment, based in San Rafael (about 30 minutes north of San Francisco).They had the advantage of a) actual products b) actual sales and c) a lot of intelligent people. The games I have worked on are mainly sports games, most recently leading the development of NBA 2K6 for the Xbox 360. I've had a lot of fun coaxing maximum performance out of video game hardware and actually applying a surprising amount of maths I didn't think I'd need again.
The last ten years in the USA have been a mixture of amazing (starting from scratch in a new country - new friends, new life) and depressing (Bush II and all the insanity). San Francisco has been a wonderful city to live in, a pocket of insanity of its own kind, set dead against the values of the America you see on the news. I live in a little house high up a hill in an area called Golden Gate Heights, with my partner Yuri and two cats. We're planning to come back to Sydney to live in the near future. Ten years here has been long enough, and I could never really leave Australia behind.

Who are the most important people in your life today?
That's easy. My dear partner Yuri, our families and and close friends.

Needed - Falconian Magazine '84, '85 and '87

Tony Robinson has copies of the Falconian magazine for '82, '83 and '86 - it would be great if we have a full set available at the reunion for people to look through. If you have copies of the other years and can bring them along please let us know.

Profile - Andrew Chang

What are your strongest memories of NSBHS?
My main memories of school are:
1. My friends who hung out on the Headmasters lawn (principally being Michael Jones, Luke Tristram, John Affleck, Stephen Porter, David Katz, Craig Culpin, Peter Arender and David Hendy). I only see Michael Jones regularly now, however still catch up with Luke Tristram (when he is in the country) and Craig Culpin, Ben Teh and John Affleck on what seems to be the annual Christmas drinks get together.
2. The teachers who we had (Mr Johnstone (Social Sciences), Mr Dawson (Social Sciences), Mr Van Wensveen (Science), Mr Darling (Science), Mr Richards (maths), Mr Causer (English) - who I see around the city occasionaly in his Barrister robes.
3. Tormenting Luke Tristram. We used to step on his lunch, make him run "the gauntlet" where we would all have turns pushing him around, and burning him when he was in the shower on the Year 9(?) trip to Canberra. Not sure why we did all that! - Luke and I are still good friends (went to his wedding, but he missed mine).
Summarise briefly your life since school
Went to UNSW, studying Commerce, and had the luxury of David Hendy drive me to Uni for the first year. When I graduated I joined Price Waterhouse in the Audit and Business Services area (which I really enjoyed). Left there after about 5 years and joined the Australian operation of JP Morgan as the Business Group Controller for their Foreign Exchange, Interest Rate Risk Management and Credit areas. I resigned after 2 years after having one of those "self awareness" moments. I was in the office at 2am working away when my second in charge at the time looked at me, and she said "Why are we still here?". We decided that morning that we were going to go travelling together to see Europe and the USA. We resigned on the same day about a week later (which sparked lots of gossip and also caused grief to the firm) and travelled together for a good 4 months. It was great fun, and Danielle has since become one of my closest friends.
After getting back from overseas, I joined Bankers Trust/BT Financial Group as the Head of Business Risk Consulting (BRC) where my team provided risk consulting services and advice. I really enjoyed this job until the New York office blew itself up (not literally, but financially) and sold the Australian operations. Things went downhill from then, and I left after 5 years to join Commonwealth Bank as an Executive Manager in Finance and Risk Management (where I am now). My role at CBA means I support the Wealth Management and International Financial Services business of the Bank (which in a nutshell covers the Funds Management, Superannuation, Insurance and International operations of the Bank)
During the time I was working, I went on and did some extra study, obtaining my Chartered Accountant qualification (I am also on the NSW Council), a Graduate Diploma in Applied Finance from Finsia (where I am also an Education Practitioner) and a Master of Management.
On the personal side I got married in 2003 to my lovely wife. Michael Jones had the honour of being my best man, and I am now "temporarily displaced" from the North Shore and living dwon South in Sans Souci, where I have a house fairly close to my in-laws. No kids, but I do have a cat!
Who are the most important people in your life today?
My wife (Hwee-Nee), family and friends.

Profile - Leigh Sanders

What are your strongest memories of NSBHS?
Unfortunately, I cut class way too much to have that many memories is NSBHS. I always remember the one morning that I showed up to Physics class and Mr. Stevens(?) asked me why I was there and when I told him I was in his class he said that he thought that my name on his roster was a typo. The school formal still has a lot of memories for me; I think everyone had a good time that night. I do often remember hanging out with the likes of Colin Mooney and Jason Diepeveen and enjoying friendships that are still important to me to this day.
Summarize briefly your life since school.
Wow, I hope I don’t run on about this one! After High School, I tried to go back to VOTECH at St. Leonard’s to bring up my HSC scores to try and get into university for electrical engineering but I soon found myself partying way too much and working full time. Luckily I had a moment of clarity and decided to come back to the States by joining the military. I flew to Manila, Philippines where I stayed with my brother for eight months getting paperwork done and exploring what I wanted to do in the military. I finally settled on nuclear engineering in the Navy and off I went. After two years of Navy schools I ended up being dis-enrolled for “immaturity” (yes, there is a whole other story there) and I was assigned to a ship located 15km south west of Seattle, Washington as a mechanic in 1991 on the USS CAMDEN. I met the love of my life and got married in 1993 to my wife Sheila and we had our first child; Israel, in 1994.
In 1995 I changed my job rating in the Navy and was assigned to the USS DAVID R. RAY, 40km north of Seattle until 1998.
From 1998 to 2002 I was a Navy recruiter near my wife’s home town and it was a nice change of pace. In 2000 my wife and I had our second son Isaiah, our third son, Isaac was born in 2001 and our daughter, Isabella was born in 2002.
For the past four years I have been assigned to the USS INGRAHAM in Everett, Washington and have reached the rank of ‘Chief”. The US Navy ranking system is similar to the English military but to put it simply of the nine different enlisted levels (E1 - E9), I am classified as an E-7. Making Chief was a career milestone that has meant the most to me since I enlisted. Another career milestone I achieved while assigned to this ship is to become a Journeyman Mechanic in any industry. I have also been honored while I have been on this ship to be assigned as the ships “Lay Service Reader” which means that I fill the role as the ships chaplain in whatever capacity I can since the ship does not have enough personnel to warrant a Navy Chaplain.
In a few months I will be transferring back to recruiting near my wife’s home town and I am looking forward to retiring from the military in 2009.
To classify my job in the Navy is a little difficult but I have been trained or become an expert on such things as; nuclear power plants, air conditioning and refrigeration, boilers, pumps, hydraulic systems, jet engines, fuel and oil testing, diesel engines and operating a power plant. Did I mention that I drink coffee non stop?...lol.
Being in the Navy I have been blessed to have done a lot of traveling and I have been to numerous ports in Africa, the Middle East, Asia and Australia. Unfortunately, I have only been able to come back to Sydney twice since I left and I find that no other city fits me as well as Sydney does.
Who are the most important people in your life today?
With out a doubt it is my wife Sheila and our kids. I thank God everyday that I married my best friend.

Pre Reunion Drinks on 25th August

Its been a great first week, we have contact details now for around 60 blokes so we are well on track. Please keep trying to track down some of the "unidentified"
i have had some great correspondence with Leigh Sanders from his Naval Post in Washington, Todd Lynton who is having a break after a stint as Managing Director of Olympus Imaging Australia, and many more. Over the coming weeks we will hopefully feature profiles from Leigh and Todd as well as Geoff Lancaster, Luke Tristram, Todd Lynton, Ben Teh and Dean Yates as well as any others that are sent through.

Everyone is very keen to get together. There has been a couple of suggestions that we have a pre-reunion drink later this year. This sounds like a good idea so lets target Friday 25th August at good ol' Percies tavern. Let us know asap if this date is not suitable.

Ps The date used to say 26th August which was an error.

Profile - John Chambers

We will try and someone different to answer these three questions each week between now and the reunion, so keep coming back to check them out.
I have put my neck on the line and started the ball rolling myself.

What are your strongest memories of NSBHS?
Four things come straight to mind.
First is that I wasn't all that nice. I remember being a bit of arse and quite unpleasant to many people at times (sorry to all those who this might apply to, looking forward to saying sorry in person at the reunion).
Second I remember big games of sport in the playground. Huge cricket matches at lunchtime in the bottleyard, with Mugunthan bowling some nasty googlies to Damo. Or big packs of people flying for marks in an Aussie Rules kickoff on Keele St. Good Times
Third would be some of the teachers. Plunkett, Jurd, Lynch, Hunt, Stewart-Smith all come readily to mind.
Fourth was accidentally clocking Adrian Buddle with a full swing of a baseball bat while he was running at full pace in North Sydney Park - I still can't believe I didn;t kill him.
Summarise briefly your life since school
Took a year off and worked as a barista (I was before my time - that was 1988!!). The slowly worked through an economics degree at Macquarie uni, while working as a bartender, waiter or Maitre-D in establishments such as the Exchange Hotel in Balmain or the Royal Hotel in Paddington. Went to Europe with Nick Noble for about year circa 1992 - some fun times.
Stopped drinking ( I had had enough :-) after I go tback from that trip and then moved on to work as a Drug and Alcohol Worker and Half-Way House Manager at the Langton Clinic in Surry Hills through the mid nineties.
Married my wife Liz in 1996 (we actually met at Steps/Danceteria in 1988! I think I went to that place every Thursday night without fail for about 4 years!) Lots of NSBHS boys there, Duncan Young was best man.
Stumbled into IT roles at the South eastern Area Health Service and then into Syntegra (British Telecom) as an Account Manager for outsourced IT Service contracts (thanks Damien King for getting me that job!). Then moved from there into Project Director roles at Telstra (thanks again Damo).
Started having kids in the late nineties.
Moved into a variety strategy roles in Telstra and BigPond over the last 5 years.
18 months ago moved to Seaforth to get closer to the beach and plant a new Vineyard church (too hard to explain all the background to this, ask me at the reunion if you are interested). So today I am bi-vocational - 4 days at Telstra doing strategy and a day a week getting a new church up and running. Loving it.
Have kept in pretty good touch with Dunc, Damo, Loges, Pandrews, Wilso, Allard, Films, Puke, Bandrews etc since school, especially due to our annual cricket match aainst Aloysius which I am proud to tell you we won handsomely a few weeks back - special thanks to our ring in Rog Faulkner there. Also close to Geoff Lancaster and more recently see a lot of John Gray.
Who are the most important people in your life today?
Easy. My wife of 10 years Liz, my kids Josh (8), Ella (6) and Zoe (4) who are all at Balgowlah North Public School. See photo.

Contact email address

If you are not comfortable leaving your email address on a blog comment, please just email us at nsbhs87@gmail.com so we have your details. We will not publish our overall list of addresses on the web at any stage, it will be released to the group in a secure format at a later date. cheers john

Suggested Venue and Date

Chris White has suggested Friday 2nd March, 2007 as a date and the Oaks Function Rooms as a venue.
Cost is $25 per head which gets us the room and a BBQ feed, and drinks are at bar prices.

Geoff Lancaster has suggested we also have a picnic the following day at somewhere like Centennial Park so we can bring family and friends along.

Let us know your thoughts on these ideas by commenting on this post.

Reunion 2007

This blog has been set up to help organise a reunion for the leaving class of 1987 from North Sydney Boys High School.
John Chambers and Geoff Lancaster have started the organising but if you would like to get involved please let us know by leaving a comment on this blog.
So far we have contact details for Duncan Young, Paul Andrews, Luke Anisimoff, Carl Hammerschmidt, Damien King, David Filmer, Ben Andrews, Pete Wilson, Phil Dubber, Tim Burcham, Mike Lee, Mike Cooper, Tom Allard, Pete Logan, Roger Faulkner, Peter Llewelyn Smith, Anthony Robinson, Ben Teh, John Gray, Mike Cooper. Check the comments on this post to see others as we get them.

Right now we are interested in gathering contact details and any ideas you might have for the reunion (venues etc.) I reckon Percies Tavern would be perfect place but not sure what it is like these days. Later this year we will finalise a date (probably in first quarter 2007) and a venue.

If we don't have your details yet please leave a comment against this blog with your email address and anything else you want to say!